Ultra Sexy Suspension, and scheduling update

A big thank you to our newest sponsor Stance USA! Stance makes some killer suspension systems and coilovers for many vehicles, including our S13 240sx. They’ve stepped up to the plate and offered us a sweet deal on one of their Pro Comp 3 setups for our S13 Land Speed car. Thanks guys!

These are OEM Fitment coilovers for all four corners of an S13 and will drop right on to any stock S13 chassis, that said, we’re not exactly running a stock S13 chassis or suspension any more so we’re going to have to get a little unorthodox to fit these to the rear of our car. The fronts will drop right on like stock with the only difference being the need to mount the external reservoir. The rears however are going to be pretty trick. Since we’re ditching the the stock Independent Rear Suspension in favor of a GM 10-bolt solid rear axle we don’t have space in the stock locations for the rear coilovers. We could have boxed in the strut towers raising them up a bunch higher, but that would have looked goofy, limited wheelbase adjustment with the 4-link, and left the coilovers out in the salt. Unfortunately up front they have to be in the salt, but the rears we’re moving inside the car.

Chad Ernst, owner of Fat Cat Fabrication is the designer of the ‘Track Cat’ suspension system for S13 240sx’s and he took that idea and modified it a bit to use the stock style rear coilovers we picked up from Stance, and it’s going to be slick! Check out these pictures:

So the rear coilovers will be 100% inside the vehicle, with an arm coming off the bottom corner where Chad’s right hand is there and running through a sealed boot (to keep the salt out) down to the rear solid axle. I know I’m going to get asked ‘why did you do it that way’ so many times that I should probably have brochures mae up to silently pass out when I am, so I’ll go ahead and give the reasoning here. Primary reason — we didn’t have room to use the OEM style coilovers under the car. Secondary reasons — it’ll reduce unsprung weight, keep salt off the shocks entirely, and it looks dead sexy. There, that’s pretty much it. ;)

Update on the four-link: It’s finished.

Another development: We will have no brake pedal. That’s right, no brakes on the floor at all. Instead we’re using this CNC Handbrake that’s been mounted right at my left hand:

We’re running only rear brakes and nothing on the front in an effort to reduce drag and unsprung weight. I’ll make sure to ‘train my brain’ not to jump on the brakes if we get out of shape at speed, but having them on a handle and not on a pedal will make that slightly easier to remember as well. ‘Chute first, then brakes…

I’ve shown the engine mounts before, but here’s another look at both of them:

And now the not so great news… our unfortunate need to reschedule the car’s debut…

As you may have already suspected it’s looking less and less likely that we’ll be making it to SpeedWeek 2012 as that’s about 6 weeks away and we’ve still got a LOT to do. However do not let your heart be troubled, all is not lost! The car is coming along GREAT, just isn’t ready yet… We’re still moving forward with the build and we’ll either run it in October for World Finals on the salt flats, or we’ll run some ECTA events later this and early next year and then go to SpeedWeek 2013 with the car.

Long story short, sales slowed down for the summer like they usually do and I’ve got to focus on keeping the business (and the jobs it sustains) alive and healthy so the fun stuff becomes secondary. We deal with this slow period every year, it’s no surprise, we were hoping to reduce it’s impact some this year and might have done so a little, but it appears many of you guys/gals quit spending money on your cars in the summer for some reason… maybe you’re all on vacation or it’s too hot to work in the garage? I dunno… but it happens every year.

We’re continuing to press forward on the build and will keep this page updated with the latest! It’s going to take a little longer than we’d hoped, but it’ll be a blast and should be good for several records over time.

I (Jerry) am still going to fly out to Speed Week solo and crew for a couple of customers that are running our MegaSquirt EFI Systems out there, including one I’m pretty excited about — Lee Sicilio’s 300+mph potential Daytona running MS3X EFI at somewhere around 2000whp! I’ll keep you updated on that as well.